European Commonwealth
|official_languages = |regional_languages = See language |government_type = |leader_title1 = Prime Minister |leader_name1 = Nicholas Forge |leader_title2 = |leader_name2 = Parliament |established_event1 = Treaty of Brussels |established_date1 = 9 May 1983 |GDP_PPP = tbd |GDP_PPP_year = 2014 |GDP_PPP_per_capita = tbd |GDP_nominal = tbd |GDP_nominal_year = 2014 |GDP_nominal_per_capita = tbd |area_km2 = 3,722,634 |area_sq_mi = 1,437,317.02 |population_estimate = 429,509,502 |population_estimate_year = 2014 |population_density_km2 = 115.38 |population_density_sq_mi = 298.827 |HDI = 0.915 |HDI_year = 2014 |HDI_category = very high |currency = European euro |currency_code = EGE |date_format = DD/MM/YY |cctld = .eg |calling_code = +44 |aircraft_code = EG |vehicle_reg = EGE }} The European Commonwealth, commonly referred to in as just Europe or the Commonwealth, is a composed of a large part of the landmass of the continent of located mainly in the historical regions of , , , and . Composed of 26 regions and a single capital territory, the Commonwealth has a population of 429,509,502 and a land area of 3,722,634 square kilometres, making it the world's 3rd and 7th largest nation respectively. Europe is a with an chosen directly from the . The parliament holds sovereignty as the single central governing entity within the Commonwealth, making it the single most influential point of national governance and policy. The prime minister is selected from the leader of the largest party or coalition of parties within the parliament, meaning that the powers of the executive derive from the parliament itself. The European government is a federal-like government in which the national government always holds the power to overrule the indivisible members of the union. As defined in the nation's constitution, the national government holds all powers of government, and those powers not explicitly derived from the national government are then given to the regions. Therefore, the Commonwealth is considered to be a with a semi-federal system in place under a parliamentary republic in which the national legislature is supreme. Europe has a long, complex history stretching as far back as to the first human arrivals between 45,000 and 25,000 BCE during the . Through thousands of years of development, the period of arose with the . From Ancient Greece came the modern concepts of , , , and many more fundamental features of contemporary European society which were spread by the conquests of . The , whose roots came from the dictator , and was expanded to encompass the entire by , was one of the first major unifying governments of Europe, at its peak extending over most of southern, western, and southeastern Europe. Due to a split by west and east around the year 300 CE and continuous attacks by from the 4th to 5th century, Western Rome fell by 476, leading to the beginning of the . Although had been introduced under the Empire, the most pious period of European history was after the fall of the western portion of the Empire in this period. Germanic dominance over the former Western Rome would see the develop a hegemony of power over the other peoples of Western Europe, culminating in the establishment of the around 800 by . It is around this time that the , the last place dominated by , were subject to waves of settlement by Germanic , eventually forming by 927, and emerged as an independent kingdom. The was at its zenith of power in the early 11th century under , a period which saw the migrations of many peoples across Europe, such as the . The saw religious piety and zeal invade the to establish crusader states with the support of the , paving the way to the by reforming knowledge bonds between Ancient Roman and Greek works that had been lost in the Middle Ages with Europeans. While dynastic powers in Europe came under political and economic pressure from the and the , a rebirth of ancient Greek and Roman knowledge from came about in the early 14th century which was spread throughout Europe by the . The challenged existing views of science and theology as supported by the , and saw the development of the and the along with the influences of and on culture and society. The , jump started by the of and , established oceanic trading links across the world and saw the first beginnings of , producing the . A combination of New World resources coupled with the of Great Britain would lead to the development of economics based on manufacturing rather than agriculture. The and the would see the establishment of the first as idealized in the French-centered , leading to the and the spread of the ideals of , , and across Europe under . A massive expansion of the Industrial Revolution lead to the creation of competition between the nation-states of Europe and the development of , , and among its peoples. A series of wars and revolutionary movements throughout the 19th century saw the creation of nation-states such as and , and the development of centralized powers resulted in the at the peak of the . The intense nationalism and the militaristic tendencies of these large colonial European empires would lead to the outbreak of the in 1914. Following an German and Austo-Hungarian defeat in 1918, Germany was placed into massive debt and economic disaster and Austria-Hungary was dismantled into smaller nation-states. The massive German economic disaster, coupled with the effects of the would see the rise of and through the collapse of many democratic states, leading to the rise of and in 1922 and and in 1933, which would eventually lead to the . Following Allied victory in 1945, Europe was divided along the , split between support for the and the . It was from the non-communist Western Europe that the was founded as the precursor to the European Commonwealth. The economies of Italy and West Germany recovered in the postwar economic boom, and the first notions of Pan-Europeanism began to spread across the ECC. Under the leadership of Johannes Sieg, the European Commonwealth was established by the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, West Germany, Italy, and Austria in the 1983 Treaty of Brussels. Following the fall of the in 1989 and the itself in 1991, Europe was depolarized and the Commonwealth was expanded to include many former non-communist countries and certain non-aligned countries in the 1992 Treaty of Vienna. Upon the adoption of the Zagreb Agreement in 1995, the Commonwealth was expanded to include Slovenia and Croatia, reaching its contemporary boundaries. The European Commonwealth is a , , and economy focused on the ideas of pragmatic laissez faire. Europe is a heavily developed country which was the root of the Industrial Revolution and , and as a result, is one of the oldest free markets in the world. Under a series of policies recognizing that markets should exist in a self regulating state and that certain institutions would be better off in the hands of state management, Europe is sometimes considered to be a synthesis of and , while most Europeans attribute this to staying true to the values of economist . Extremely diverse and highly productive, the economy of Europe is based upon a wide variety of goods, practices, and services which had survived some level of and . Policies aimed at continuing both primary and secondary economic sectors and a cultural value of self reliance have seen the survival of many agricultural and industrial practices that lead to lower profits, albeit are better for the people as a whole. As moral implications have triumphed profit motives, Europe is considered to be a state in which post-materialism has developed. While Europeans as a whole are much less commercially-driven than most other capitalist countries, innovation and education remain high, with many international standards of education being set in Europe itself. The Commonwealth is considered to be economically, politically, and socially free. Europe is a founding member of the , the , the , the , the , the , the , the , and the . Etymology The word Europe comes from the Ancient Greek , a princess whom abducted in the form of a white bull, where she became the queen of . According to the Ancient Greeks, the term Europa was a name for the queen and not a geological designation. It is assumed that the name derives from the Ancient Greek word broad, eurus, and thus stems into the word Europe. The name was first known to be applied in the 6th century BCE by Greek geographers, meaning broad-place, with broad itself being a common epithet for the at large. The term was adopted in the to refer to the areas under the influence of and was not developed to extend in reference to the contemporary continent until the 19th century. While the name Europe still refers to the continent as a whole, the term was adopted to refer specifically to the European Commonwealth upon the adoption of the constitution, which referred to itself as a constitution for Europe as a whole and was meant to extend itself in such a way. As per the Zagreb Agreement, signed twelve years after the adoption of the constitution, the Commonwealth agreed not to be ambitious in its extension in accordance with the . Therefore, while Europe can refer to both the Commonwealth and the continent, most non-Commonwealth Europeans hence refrain from referring to themselves as Europeans, much as the situation with the and the word American. The official name of the nation is the European Commonwealth, in reference to the commonality of all Europeans under the agreement and in order to distance itself from the nation being referred to as a federal or unitary state, of which it considers itself to be neither, but rather, a country of countries. Category:European Commonwealth Category:Nations